


take my hand (we'll make it i swear)

by cipherstranger



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Emotional Baggage, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-13
Updated: 2016-11-13
Packaged: 2018-08-30 20:51:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8548690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cipherstranger/pseuds/cipherstranger
Summary: As long as we always have hope, as long as we keep trying, as long as we have each other, we can get through anything.
  
  (—right?)
Yuma and Rei meet as children and run away together.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Lea for beta-reading.

 

It began as fairytales do, with a dream of a beautiful future: a wing and a prayer and a vision of the lights at night over the river in the city, when they were eighteen and innocent and convinced without reason that everything is going to be fine.

_As long as we always have hope, as long as we keep trying. As long as we have each other, we can get through anything._

Now Vector sleeps on his side facing away from Yuma, holding his own secrets and memories close; Yuma lies awake staring at the ceiling, willing himself to fall asleep because work is already going to be hard without making it worse by not resting.

Exhaustion settles over him like a fog. Yuma raises one hand to his chest, force of habit; the Key is a small warm weight against bare skin. He thinks, _kattobingu_ , and doesn't feel anything.

 

* * *

 

Rei had said: you must run. Run as fast as you can just to stay in one place. You try your best, not because you think you can get somewhere, but because if you don't you fall by the wayside and get left behind.

 

* * *

 

_Kattobingu._

As Yuma is going on break the cord of the Key catches on a shelf. The leather cord tears in two, and the Key falls awkwardly and snaps in half as it hits the floor. Yuma picks up the pieces and looks at them, then stows them away into his bag.

He feels very cold. He thinks the necklace was important to him before, but that was such a long time ago, and no matter how hard he thinks about it now he can't quite remember why.

 

* * *

 

In second grade Shingetsu Rei hid a fruit knife in his backpack and stabbed his seatmate in the neck, and his mother took him and fled the country rather than let him be institutionalized.

In Heartland City Rei learned quickly to be deferential, to keep a low profile and to fit in. He learned quickly to lie about where he was before, why he moved, why he doesn't have a father. Always smile, always be sweet and kind, and never tell the truth because it will make people turn against you.

In seventh grade he got assigned the desk next to Tsukumo Yuma. Yuma was very like that boy from before: so happy and hopeful, so unerringly kind, so sickening to Rei that he wanted nothing more than to pin Yuma to the desk and slice his chest open and find out if he still smiles so much when he's holding his own lungs in his hands.

They became best friends, because Rei made so many enemies he couldn't walk home alone, and Yuma was there and accessible and Rei is not above implicating bystanders if it means self-protection.

The first time they held hands, they were crossing the street on the way to the train station after school. A car ran the pedestrian crossing, and Rei yelled Yuma's name and grabbed his hand and pulled him to safety. He didn’t let go until they reached the station.

 

* * *

 

"The Key can be fixed, right?" Vector says. "That's what you did before when that guy broke it in first grade."

"Yeah, I can," Yuma says. "But I think it's for the best that I don't bring it there any more."

"Maybe," Vector says. "Yuma, is everything okay?"

"— I don't know," Yuma replies. "Is it, Vector?"

Vector reaches for Yuma's shoulder to pull him close. "If it's not, it will be," he whispers into Yuma's hair. "Everything's going to be all right."

Yuma is not sure Vector has ever told the whole truth in his life. But Yuma has also always been good at blindly believing what people say, so he buries his face in Vector's shoulder and cries and cries until there aren't tears left.

 

* * *

 

In the beginning, the Key's weight was distracting, and Akari would pick it up from the sofa or the dining table and then reprimand him for leaving it around. In the beginning, Yuma would crash into the stack boxes at gym class and hear the laughter of others and decide he won't try again next time.

But Akari always left the Key on Yuma's desk for him to find. Shingetsu Rei always came up to him after gym class as Yuma was getting the Key back out of his locker and said, "It's for the best, I know you'll make it next time."

In time, Yuma learned to pick the Key off the nightstand in the morning when he was dressing and put it back at night when he went to bed. In time, kattobingu came as easily as breathing.

 

* * *

 

Vector never holds down a regular job for more than three months. On paper, he writes freelance; in reality, he sometimes disappears for days on end without telling Yuma where he's going, but when he returns it's always with haunted eyes and enough money to pay the bills. He doesn't like talking about it, so Yuma stops asking, gets used to buying stronger fabric cleaners and keeping the first aid kit stocked.

 

* * *

 

"Yuma, what would you do if you found out one of your friends did something really, really bad?"

"Does he feel bad about having done it, enough that he will never do it again?"

Rei thought about telling the truth, then about self-protection. He thought about the warmth of Yuma's hands, about spending the better part of a lifetime running from something people didn’t know even existed. "Yes, he does."

Yuma pursed his lips thoughtfully. "Then, I guess it's fine."

 

Yuma knew that Rei told lies. He knew this because more than once he opened his window at 1 a.m. and let Rei crash on his floor for the night, dressed Rei's injuries behind the stairwell by the staff office at school and stole mom's makeup to help him hide the signs, and then watched Rei walk into class like nothing had happened and say with a smile to every person he meets hello, hi, how are you, I’m fine.

(Everyone who had ever hurt Yuma ended up transferring schools, and when Yuma tried to find out why Rei just squeezed Yuma's hand and says, "It's for the best this way.")

There was something wrong with Shingetsu Rei, and Yuma knew and let himself fall anyway.

Because someone who fought this hard just to seem like he was not fighting at all, in order that things could go on the way they were—

— must really value everything he has right now. Including Yuma.

 

* * *

 

"Yuma?" Static over the phone line. "Yuma, is that you?"

"Yeah, it's me, Shark," Yuma replies. Suddenly he misses Shark a lot, and everyone and Heartland and home and tears are welling up in his eyes and he is not sure why.

"Yuma. It's— good to hear from you."

"Yeah." Yuma presses the phone closer. "It's been a while."

"Yuma, you don't sound too..."

"It's nothing," Yuma says. "It's fine—"

And then Shark's gone because Vector has the phone in his hand and hits end call before Yuma can react. "I told you before I don't like you talking to him."

Yuma doesn't argue.

"You said you chose me, Yuma. So stand by your word."

"I always have," Yuma says, surprised by how much he means it. "I always will."

 

* * *

 

"What are you going to do after high school, Yuma?"

"I don't know. Apply to university, maybe. What about you?"

"I'm leaving.”

"Where?"

"Sargasso."

Yuma had only ever heard about that place, on the opposite side of the country where people speak a different dialect of the same language. It is not hostile, but also not welcoming to people like them. It is difficult to live there.

“Is it better there?”

“I can’t stay here.”

Yuma did not say, ‘That’s not an answer’. Shingetsu Rei never had answers for what should be easy questions, and in five months he would be a legal adult and responsible for the consequences of all his actions.

"You'll be alone, won't you?"

"Yeah. But I've always been, so it's for the best that way, right?"

Yuma nodded. “It’ll be all right, Rei. No matter where you end up, I know you’ll be all right.”

“If you say it, then I’ll believe it, Yuma.”

It was late in the afternoon and the sky turned red as the sun began to set. Rei said, "Let's go home," and Yuma fell in step beside him as they made their way to the train station ten minutes away.

"Bye," Rei said as they tap in, because Yuma took the train going in the other direction.

"Wait, Rei. I'll go with you."

"Sorry, Yuma. Mom doesn't like visitors."

"I don't mean to your house. I mean— wherever you go."

Behind them, Yuma's train pulled away from the platform. Yuma thought about the Key's weight around his neck and squeezed Rei's hand and hoped Rei understood.

"Yuma, I'm sorry, but no. I can't drag you down with me."

"You won't, Rei. I'm stronger than you think. Besides, you trust me, right?"

 _No, I don't._ "Yes, I do."

"Then believe me, it's better not to be alone. As long as we're together, we can get through anything."

 _No, Tsukumo Yuma, you can't help me_.

Rei nodded and hugged Yuma and says, "You should go home. It's getting late." He thought, he should have left without saying anything.

 

* * *

 

“It is going to be all right,” Yuma says.

(It’s not.)

“It’s not,” Vector says.

“It is.”

"You're an idiot if you really believe that."

"But you trust me," Yuma says.

Vector’s face twists. "I don't _trust._ I _know._ I know that you won’t betray me and you won’t resent this and you won’t ever leave me. The same way, no matter how impossible things get, you will make yourself believe that it is okay. And for a while, if I tried very very hard, I could believe you too. But maybe I cannot any more, because _I, unlike you, am not an idiot.”_

"But you don't leave, either," Yuma points out.

"You think so—?”

Vector stands up, grabs his keys and stalks out of the apartment without saying where he was going or for how long. But even though Yuma does not know, he is not afraid. Because he believes in Vector, and Vector always comes back and he always will.

 

* * *

 

Yuma put off telling Shark for as long as he could because he knew it could not end well, and he was not wrong.

"What the hell does Rei want asking you to go to a place like that?"

“Rei didn’t ask. I said I’d go.”

"Yuma, that place is no good and no place for someone like you. If that guy has a death wish that's on him, but do not let him drag you into this—"

"— you've always had something against Rei, right?" Yuma said softly, and Shark went completely white and Yuma knew he’d crossed a line.

Shark bit out, "I'm done, if you want to ruin your life then fine," and turned on his heel and left.

— Yuma knew that Shark cared about him. But Yuma was eighteen and in love and flying blind on hope, and Rei had never let him down and he had always believed that if you try hard enough, you can get through anything.

(—right?)

Shark didn’t show up at Yuma’s graduation.  
Kaito said, don't.  
Kotori said, you should think through this again.  
Akari said, you're old enough to decide for yourself.

Yuma knew they were right. He wondered what dad would do, and then he put it out of his mind.

 

* * *

 

Vector returns with groceries and the mail, and after Yuma helps him put it away he hugs Yuma so tightly Yuma can’t breathe. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Yuma whispers. “You’re okay. We’re okay.”

(Seven years ago on a clear night they walked down the bank of Heartland River and looked over the water at the lights of the city. Yuma looked down at their linked hands and said "Don't let go," and Rei said, "I won't.")

 

* * *

 

The girl at the front desk of the leasing office tripped over Yuma's name, so when Rei introduced himself he said, "Call me Vector."

"It's an old nickname," he told Yuma later. "Our real names are difficult for people here to say, so just call me Vector from now on."

Yuma had never had secrets like that, and he decided to keep his own name for now.

 

* * *

 

"Shark— Shark said he can help. If we go back."

Vector's face twists when he hears that man's name, but he knows Yuma is right. Heartland City is a place of opportunities and second chances— for those who deserve it. Yuma can still go home. He can start over, and choose better this time.

Shingetsu Rei, on the other hand, is not someone the world can forgive.

"If _you_ go back," Vector amends lightly, and Yuma looks at him and understands.

"Then I won't."

( _We promised we'd always be together. As long as we have each other, we can get through anything._ The words are hollow now, but that does not make them meaningless.)

Vector should say, _don't stay for my sake_. But the fear of Yuma leaving outweighs any pang of conscience he could have had, so he reaches out and pulls Yuma into a hug instead. "I'm sorry, Yuma," he murmurs into Yuma's hair, his arms tighten around Yuma's shoulders.

"Don't apologize," Yuma says, surprised at how warm the words are. "And I— I'm sorry, too. That I couldn't help as much as I thought I could. But it's fine. We're fine. We'll both do better, won't we?"

 _Yes, I will._ "Yes, we will," Vector says sincerely for the first time in his life, and closes his eyes, and breathes.

 


End file.
